After years of Witch School International trying to build a “Salem of the Midwest” in the Rossville-Hoopeston area of Central Illinois, a move that garnered plenty of publicity and hostility as the Witches tried to co-exist in a town dominated by conservative Christians dealing with a depressed economy and a troubling meth problem, the school has decided its time to move on.

“Witch School Headquarters are closing in the Rossville-Hoopeston area of Illinois. Witch School settled from Chicago to Central Illinois in 2003, and became the center of protest by many of the Christian Churches in the area. A well-documented spiritual battle has been waged for the last six years, with open hostilities and long quiet truces by various Christian factions. Simply put, this has not allowed Witch School the staff and resources needed to keep up with their growth. On Halloween, Witch School Rossville will close permanently, and Witch School will be moving its HQ to ‘The Witch City’, Salem Mass.”

As rumored since earlier this year, Witch School will stop trying to build their own Salem, and simply join the Salem that already is. Becoming a part of the massive tourist-friendly oasis custom-built for media-hungry Witches with outsized personalities. With the move now underway, Witch School CEO Ed Hubbard wants us to know it wasn’t because of Christian hostility that they are going, but because of a lack of communications resources.

“The Churches are not the cause, they are a symptom of the problems in rural areas, and that is the lack of useful educational resources. While the United States Urban areas have been undergoing a communications and information revolution, the Digital Divide between those areas and places like Rossville IL, which has very few Internet carriers, all very expensive, and very undependable, has continued to grow. Our Internet provider has terrible customer service, and been down as much as a week at a time, on a regular basis, and we use the same one the city government uses. Also attempts to provide computer training and employment saw pressure on participants to quit and boycott the business. The Churches believing that they were ‘protecting’ the community, have rejected and blocked several attempts by Witch School to improve Internet Service in the area. So it has become necessary to find a place where we can get the online access and staff we need to continue our growth.”

Not that it will stop Hoopeston-area pastors from bragging anyway. While I’m fairly certain their Internet service will be better (and the neighbors friendlier) in Massachusetts than in rural Illinois, it isn’t a leap to assert that the costs of doing business will be far higher in Salem, so it remains to be seen how well Witch School will actually do. As for Witch School’s students, they seem for the most part to be understanding and optimistic about the change in location. No doubt you can expect Witch-School folks to be popping up on reality television shows and taking advantage of national Halloween-oriented coverage of Salem any time now.

A few stories for you to digest this Saturday, starting with the announcement yesterday from Isaac and Phaedra Bonewits concerning the closure of their Internet venture Real Magic School.

“Isaac and Phaedra Bonewits are sad to announce that Real Magic School is now closed. It was a wonderful experiment but it turned out to be too much for our time commitments (and our finances) to handle. We have arranged with the Grey School of Wizardry to take transfer student s from RMS. We apologize to everyone, but especially our lifetime members, that the life time of Real Magic School was so short.”

The school, which opened for business in February 2008, had an aspirational trajectory of academic excellence and eventual accreditation. A somewhat different M.O. from the arranged transfer school, the Grey School of Wizardry, with its Harry Potter-isms and courses that equip someone to become a “Journeyman Wizard” (as opposed to the associates degrees RMS was planning to award). No doubt the current fiscal climate made this new venture difficult to sustain, it would be interesting to know how other schools (loosely) built on the Witch School model are doing.

CBS affiliate WBOC in Delmarva, Delaware reports on this Sunday’s Delmarva Pagan Pride Day, interviewing author, Wiccan elder, and event co-organizer Ivo Dominguez Jr. in the process. Too bad they also felt the need to get some “balance” by also digging up a disapproving Christian pastor.

“Still, some like Salisbury Pastor Luther Hill disagree, and say nothing positive can come out of the event.” “Pagans in the Bible usually deal with witchcraft and sorcery and those types of things,” Rev. Hill said. “But even in the Bible when that type of thing has gone on, the power of God has always been victorious over it.”

I wouldn’t mind this somewhat mindless faux-viewpoint-balance if the standard was also applied to puff coverage of local Christian events as well. Needless to say, I’m still awaiting a call regarding my opinions on upcoming Christmas celebrations.

In a final note, it’s time once again to check in with our old friend Don “internationally recognized authority on Ritual Crime and the Occult” Rimer. This time he’s making an appearance at the Oklahoma Gang Investigators Association seminar to talk about Satanic and vampire-related crime.

“Guest speaker Don Rimer spent over three decades as police officer in Virginia, where he discovered crimes involving cult activity.  Satanists committed some of these crimes, but some culprits acted as vampires … Rimer says movies like “Blade” and “Twilight” made vampirism cool, and people commit themselves to being vampires.  Rimer shows the official vampire bible, and there are sanguine who legally practice the ritualist consumption of human blood by drinking each other’s.”

This time the paper also includes his disclaimer that Wiccans and Pagans are no more likely to be criminals than any other citizen, but that kindness is somewhat offset by the fact that attendees to Rimer’s lectures, like Lawton Police Gang Investigator, Tiff Poff, apparently believe that ” appearance is in beginning stages, and they don’t realize it leads to violence, and murder, and suicide and things like that”. So don’t get caught dressing goth in Lawton, they may think your on the fast-track to killing people.

That’s all I have for now, have a great day!

I have a few items of interest in my daily scan of the news, starting with a profile of practicing Witch and Australian singer-musician Wendy Rule. Rule is coming to Florida to perform, and the Daytona Beach News-Journal explores her Wiccan identity, and how that influences her songwriting.

A Sydney native who calls Melbourne home, Rule says, “It’s not such an unusual thing for music to have a magical and spiritual purpose. All the ritual music of traditional cultures — Aboriginal Australian and Native American shamans, folk music from across the globe, Gregorian chants and gospel music — share this same goal: to alter our consciousness and bring us in contact with the divine.” But, she adds, “I’m no more a Wiccan songwriter than I am a Scorpio songwriter, or an Australian one, or a female one. I’m just living and writing and singing and exploring my heart and soul — and I happen to be an Australian Scorpio Witch.”

While it’s nice that the paper decided to give some ink to Wendy Rule’s upcoming shows in America, you’d think they would bother to do more than simply cut-and-paste from her web site while implying they interviewed her. Maybe a long-distance phone call was too expensive for their operating budget? After all, these are hard times for newspapers.

If you want to brag once and for all that you’re as smart as (or possibly smarter than) Oberon “Grey School of Wizardry” Zell and Don “Witch School” Lewis you’ll get your chance at the upcoming St. Louis Pagan Picnic. According to a press release, they will be holding a trivia contest about “all things magical” open to all comers.

“Oberon Zell of Grey School and Don Lewis of Witch School have agreed to a trivia contest about all things magical to test their students and all comers. They plan to meet on June 13th & 14th at the St. Louis Pagan Picnic, held at Tower Grove Park. The St. Louis Pagan Picnic is the largest Pagan gathering in the Midwest, and brings together thousands for a weekend of friendship, fellowship, entertainment, teaching and merchants. The Wizards and Witches Trivia contest will be just one of the many parts to this wonderful event, but for the students of Grey School and Witch School, it is a highly anticipated one.”

The winners will receive unspecified “prizes”, one hopes that it isn’t a gift certificate to their respective schools. After all, would the winner of such a contest really need such a thing?

In a final note, workmen in Florence, Italy, while digging a hole for a new water cistern in the courthouse, stumbled across a temple to Isis.

“Workmen inside Florence’s courthouse have stumbled across a spiral column and hundreds of multicoloured fragments that experts believe may have belonged to a Roman temple dedicated to the Egyptian goddess Isis.  According to Roman news agency ANSA, the remains, dating back to the second century AD, were discovered as the men dug a five by three meter hole, barely four meters deep, for a new water cistern for the courthouse’s anti-incendiary system … the remains were “comparable” to others found over the last three centuries in the immediate area that have also been attributed to the temple of Isis, the Egyptian goddess of motherhood and fertility who was later adopted by the Greeks and Romans.  The location of the temple is unknown, but it is believed to have been built just outside the Roman part of the city, near the current courthouse building…”

Florence’s archeology superintendency is currently overseeing the discovery, no announcements have been made as to what will ultimately be done with the find. Interesting that a courthouse was unwittingly built over the temple of a goddess that the Book of the Dead calls “She who seeks justice for the poor people”.

That’s all I have for now, have a great day!

The Chicago Sun-Times wins the prize for being the first mainstream paper to explore the “mini-rise of the Wiccans” indicated in the recently-released American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) data. Too bad it’s so sloppy and lazy in its execution. First there’s the rookie mistake of referring to Wicca as “Wiccanism” (I mean really, in 2009?), then religion-beat reporter Mike Thomas starts off  with the hoary and groan-inducing “real Witches aren’t fantasy witches” bit that we all love so much.

“They don’t toil over bubbling caldrons or cook lost kids. They have no use for flying monkeys. And their spice racks are more apt to contain ginger or paprika than eye of newt.”

Then there is the matter of interview subjects.

“…there’s even a Witch School. An outgrowth of the nationally popular and long-active Web site witchschool.com, the Downstate Rossville-based organization currently offers three monthly courses and returned to town earlier this month after a five-year absence. Local classrooms include the Occult Bookstore in Wicker Park and the Life Force Arts Center in Lake View. [Rev. Don] Lewis said there’s talk of expanding to St. Louis and “a number of different regions.” [like Salem?] On a recent Friday night, Witch School CEO Ed Hubbard visited the Occult Bookstore to talk on the topic of “Magick for the Masses.” Few people attended, save for a handful of employees and one drop-in, but the show went on.”

Now I’m not bagging on the Witch School folks here, they are a (relatively) high-profile organization located in Illinois, so it’s only natural a journalist would contact them. I’m just troubled that the reporter went to exactly one source for this piece. That might fly when your doing a write-up of a metaphysical store in rural Michigan, but not in Chicago where there are literally hundreds (if not thousands) of potential interview subjects. Nor does Thomas interview someone with the ARIS study to get a better sense of the growth of new religious movements, or attempt to contact any academics who study Pagan religions for insight into modern Paganism’s growth.

Using the ARIS data to merely write yet another tired “meet the Witches” piece, complete with the usual patina of superciliousness, seems an utter wase of journalistic space. Franky, if the Sun-Times doesn’t feel that Wicca’s continued growth is worth more than calling one organization and a drop-in at the local occult shop (for a talk lead by the same group) then they should just not bother. There are several interesting stories to be told spinning out of this ARIS data, and I’d rather wait for them to emerge slowly than bide my time with inconsequential filler like this. Honestly, I’d rather read yet another piece on how well psychics are doing during the recession than this mad-libs-style approach to religion reporting.

Thought I’d share a few quick items with you that I missed in yesterday’s “News of Note”. First off, Reclaiming co-founder Starhawk opines about the recent ARIS data suggesting that modern Paganism is growing while other faiths contract.

“Why are we growing? In a time when the very life support systems of the planet are threatened by environmental destruction and global warming, many people seek a faith rooted in love and respect for nature. Women have especially been drawn to the Goddess traditions because we offer positive images of women’s power, our tealogy and religious imagery reflect women’s lives, cycles, and name our bodies as sacred, and we offer women respect and leadership roles. But many men also are drawn to a community that does not make gender a condition of power. Gay, lesbian and transgender folks find a welcome in our circles. And many people are drawn to traditions that encourage imagination, honor intuition and respect each individual’s spiritual authority.”

Starhawk also praises the Internet as a boon to modern Paganism’s growth. For more ARIS reactions from the rest of the On Faith panelists, click here.

Will Witch School give up on building a “Salem of the Midwest” in Hoopeston, IL and instead just pick up and move to the already existing Witch-mecca of Salem, Massachusetts? That is apparantly one of the agenda items for its annual international conference in Salem from April 17th – 19th.

“The group also plans to vote on whether to relocate its headquarters to downtown Salem. The move would include the relocation of Magick TV, an Internet television station broadcast on YouTube. Hubbard said he envisions a downtown TV studio that could broadcast such programs as the Pagan Nightly News. He has already been in talks with Salem landlords, he said. “My goal is to be on Essex Street,” Hubbard said.”

Considering the reception they rcceived in Hoopeston, I can hardly blame them for wanting to move, and I suppose that since Salem is a land of big personalities and ambitious impressarios they’ll fit right in.

MN Artists (and MinnPost) run a profile of “freelance druid” Bill Watkins on the publication of his third memoir “The Once and Future Celt”.

“The Once and Future Celt documents the last leg of Bill Watkins’ winding path; this final volume of his memoir trilogy, preceded by A Celtic Childhood and Scotland Is Not for the Squeamish, traces Bill’s self-definition as a Celt and, more specifically, as a modern druid and a bearer of the old traditions. Bill was raised in England by an Irish mother and a Welsh father who were both fluent in their native Gaelic languages and passionate about their ancestral traditions. Each bestowed Bill with divergent but strongly felt religious beliefs — Irish Catholicism from his mother and, from his father, an abiding faith in the old druidic beliefs held by the Celts before their conquest by the Romans.”

“Wild” Bill Watkins resides, naturally enough, in Paganistan (Minneapolis/St Paul) and performs regularly at Merlins Rest Pub.

That’s it for now!

Thanks to Juliaki for tipping me off to the fact that you can now watch the entirety of the recent indie documentary “Hoopeston” online for free. The film, directed by Thomas Bender, looks at the struggling town of Hoopeston, Illinois, and the conflicts that emerged when Witch School (and the Correllian Tradition that runs it) moved in.

Hoopeston – Trailer from Synydyne on Vimeo.

“Because buildings are so cheap in Hoopeston, a Witch School moved there from Chicago in 2003. The directors of the school faced stiff opposition from religious conservatives (Hoopeston has over a dozen churches—its other nickname is “The Holy City”). But the Witch School is now a fixture in Hoopeston, one that forces the town to ask whether its future lies in traditional industry or internet wand sales.”

For all previous coverage of this documentary, click here. You may also be interested in perusing the last couple year’s worth of The Wild Hunt’s Witch School coverage. Enjoy the documentary! Feel free to post reviews in the comments.

As we get closer to Halloween, Witch-themed media becomes a more and more popular subject for television programmers. We already know about the upcoming Salem-themed episode of “Opportunity Knocks” featuring Laurie “Official Witch of Salem” Cabot, but now cable television will be getting into the act. The Biography channel will be airing a special on Witches (ancient and modern) on October 30th (part of their October “Boo-ography” promotion).

Witness the disembodied floating head of Silver! Spooky!

According to Llewellyn Worldwide publicist Jennifer Spees, the show will be “an exploration of witchcraft from medieval times through the present”, and feature interviews with Christopher Penczak, Stefani “Spiral” Barner, and Silver Ravenwolf. It isn’t known at this point who else the Biography team interviewed, but it has been confirmed that they visited Salem (naturally), so it wouldn’t be too surprising to see Laurie Cabot or Christian Day pop up as well. I’ll refrain from speculating on what the sensationalism/accuracy ratio will be.

For those wanting to see some real live Witches on the big screen, you might want to head over to the 15th Annual Chicago Underground Film Festival, and check out the Midwest premiere of the documentary “Hoopeston” (screening, coincidentally, on October 30th). The film, directed by Thomas Bender, looks at the struggling town of Hoopeston, Illinois, and the conflicts that emerged when Witch School (and the Correllian Tradition that runs it) moved in (check out my original post on this documentary).

Hoopeston – Trailer from Synydyne on Vimeo.

“Witches will come out a day early this year. “Hoopeston,” a feature-length documentary about an Illinois town and its Witch School, will play in the Chicago Underground Film Festival on October 30, the night before Halloween. Produced by SYNYDYNE, “Hoopeston” tells the story of the former Sweet Corn Capital of the World through the lives of its residents: a laborer struggles to find work, a young entrepreneur buys the only motel in town, the police chief battles a drug epidemic, and the Correllian Chancellor lays plans for a vast Crystal Web. The film balances the stark beauty of rural Illinois with candid and moving interviews from a variety of subjects. It features an original score by composer Todd Mazierski.”

After the Midwest premiere, Synydyne will start selling DVDs of the film. They have a mailing list you can sign up for to be notified when copies are available. As for the Witch School folks, they’ll be in Salem teaching free classes through November 1st.

So whether you want to attend a movie out (in the greater Chicagoland area), or stay inside and curl up on your couch (if you have cable television), you’ll be able to gage how far forward (or back) depictions of modern Pagans have come since the days of fog-machines, strobe lighting, and the morning talk-show circuit. Happy viewing!

My semi-regular round-up of articles, essays, and opinions of note for discerning Pagans and Heathens.

The Pagan-friendly Gaea Retreat Center in Kansas, host of the annual Heartland Pagan Festival, is branching out and allowing a music festival to take place on its grounds for the first time.

“…after enduring several board meetings, Yager and his staff finally convinced the proprietors to embrace the Gaea Retreat and Music Festival, which begins at noon today. “We’ve spawned into this weird festival where it’s a mesh of cultures. We have introduced education through imagery by focusing on things like the environment, free energy, energy conservation alternatives, performing arts,” he says.”

Earth Rising, Inc., the legal entity that runs Camp Gaea, is trying to move past its infamous local past (which involved a legal battle over its permit), and reputation as a haven for Pagans and nudists. Though it remains to be seen if Camp Gaea can transform a music festival into a place to “find that realm of evenness and spiritual soundness.” While I fully attest to the spiritual power of live music, I’m not sure “evenness” and “spiritual soundness” is what you aim for.

The Claremont Institute reviews “Homer’s The Iliad and The Odyssey: A Biography”, by Alberto Manguel, and praises it as a book written with “intelligence and curiosity”.

“Manguel’s intent is to show that, for over 2,500 years, countless members of the species have found “in these stories of war in time and travel in space…the experience of every human struggle and every human displacement.” The Iliad and Odyssey, which can be thought to represent the two great metaphors of life, a battle and a journey, are the “books which, more than any others, have fed the imagination of the Western world.” In the 8th century A.D., Byzantine schoolchildren were still expected to have much of the Iliad by heart. Six hundred years later, during the Renaissance, Homer remained the cornerstone of every ambitious library.”

According to the review, Manguel does a good job of making the argument that Homer is just as relevant today as he was in antiquity, a poet who described “every secret happiness and every hidden sin.” A paperback edition of the book is due out in March of 2009.

A quick update on the “Satanic Panic Alive and Well in North Carolina” story, a judge has lowered the bail amount for Joy Suzanne Johnson, after her public defender argued that the charges against her made “no sense” and that there is a complete lack of “corroborating evidence”.

“The woman who is accused of aiding and abetting her husband in a sexual assault case and an alleged kidnapping and cane beating persuaded a Superior Court judge Thursday to reduce bail.”

Meanwhile, things aren’t looking too good for the prosecution as more and more details about the case emerge. A state assistant distract attorney said that “some if not all of the charges may need to be modified”. To catch up on this story, here is part one, and part two of my ongoing coverage.

Expect your local spiritual supply store to have a run on frankincense, Israeli scientists are claiming that the resin can ease depression and anxiety (at least in mice).

“Pharmacologists in Israel have found that frankincense, a whitish resin tapped from the veins of a shrubby tree, relieves anxiety and depression, at least in mice. In an article to be published next month in the Journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology, researchers from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and elsewhere report that the active ingredient in frankincense lights up brain receptors that play a role in the perception of warmth on the skin and might help regulate emotion.”

While covering this story, the New York Times visits a local occult shop, and finds that the employees aren’t surprised in the least by this news.

“Any kind of magic you’re doing,” Ms. Cabral said, “frankincense would be great for any kind of happiness, or success, or attention, even.”

So if things are getting a little stressed at your circle, coven, or grove, be sure to light up (some frankincense)!

This weekend will see a dance festival in Miami to celebrate the survival of West African Yoruban culture and religion.

“This weekend, Coconut Grove will celebrate a culture created in Cuba during the slave trade. The Yoruban culture and the religion Santería, or Regla de Ocha, which was brought to Cuba by the Yorubans of West Africa, are the by-products of slavery, according to Ifé-Ilé’s Artistic and Executive Director Neri Torres. With dance workshops and seminars, the Ifé-Ilé Afro-Cuban Dance & Music Festival will bring context to Miami residents. “Today, [the Yoruban culture] is still the root of Cuban culture in terms of art, music and the way we talk and gesture,” said Torres, who founded Ifé-Ilé in 1996.”

For more information about this event, head over to the Ifé-Ilé web site.

In a final note, The Esoteric Book Review takes a look at the recently released “Witch School 3rd Degree” by Rev. Donald Lewis-Highcorrell, and is disturbed by some of what he finds there.

“I was disappointed to note subtle distinctions being made which imply Correllians are better than other Wiccans and should not be surprised by the bad behaviour of non-Correllians. This smacks a bit of cultish behaviour … the return to sniping at Wicca was a little tedious and unnecessary … the last part of the book becomes a bit cultish and for me loses the plot…”

Sniping at other traditions of Wicca? Superior attitudes? Cultish behavior? Doesn’t sound like a very positive or affirming way of running a religious tradition. Nor is this the first time such accusations have been made. It should be interesting to see if Witch School responds to the claims made in the review.

That is all I have for now, have a great day!

The upcoming 15th (and final) annual New York Underground Film Festival will be hosting the international premiere of the documentary “Hoopeston”. The film looks at a formerly prosperous Illinois town as it deals with a declining economy, drugs, and the controversy caused by Witch School (and the Correllian Tradition that runs it) moving in.

Hoopeston – Trailer from Synydyne on Vimeo.

“Two and a half hours south of Chicago near the Illinois- Indiana border, once the global capital of sweet corn production, Hoopeston, according to residents, went from a town of “overachievers to underachievers in the span of just ten to fifteen years.” Church. Meth. Republicans. That’s about what’s left when town officials, hoping to create jobs, start offering to give away prominent downtown buildings to anyone with a business plan … but – whoops – guess who’s coming to dinner: a displaced Wiccan sect shopping downmarket for a good spot to open the “nation’s first witch school,” Witch School. A beads industry mover and shaker from Virginia Beach; a pagan CEO with a checkered romantic past; the Orson Welles-esque leader of the Corellian Tradition, since age thirteen… take a trip with these egos to the dork side.”

While the NYUFF description is somewhat mocking, the filmmakers seem quite sincere in wanting to impartially tell the story of the conflicts that emerged between Witch School and the heavily Christian town.

“The directors of the school faced stiff opposition from religious conservatives (Hoopeston has over a dozen churches – its other nickname is “The Holy City”). But the Witch School is now a fixture in Hoopeston, one that forces the town to ask whether its future lies in traditional industry or internet wand sales. Hoopeston tells the story of the former Sweet Corn Capital through the lives of its residents. A laborer struggles to find work, a young entrepreneur buys the only motel in town, the police chief battles a drug epidemic, and the Correllian Chancellor lays plans for a vast Crystal Web.”

The Hoopeston story doesn’t have a happy ending for Witch School. Due to a number of factors, including the ongoing lack of acceptance by locals, the school (and the Correllians) moved to the even smaller town of Rossville, Illinois to make a new start of building a “Salem of the Midwest” (a plan that seems increasingly unlikely, as Rossville seems even less enthusiastic than Hoopeston at Witch School’s presence). “Hoopeston” should be an interesting exploration of what happens when religious cultures clash outside the (mostly) tolerant (and secular) urban areas most Pagans flock to.

The New York Underground Film Festival runs from April 2nd through the 8th at the Anthology Film Archives in New York City’s East Village. “Hoopeston” is scheduled to screen on April 3 at 8:45 PM, with a repeat showing on April 8 at 9:30 PM. No word yet on other festival appearances or a DVD release.

Author, Archdruid Emeritus of the ADF, and “polytheologian” Isaac Bonewits is opening his own online school on February 29th. The new online learning institution, Real Magic School, claims to offer “certain answers to a mysterious subject.”

“Real Magic School, named after Bonewits first groundbreaking book, begins with a purposeful program of study that offers a pathway to an Associates degree in Magic. Further, the school begins immediately the process to seek academic accreditation, a process that is both difficult and demanding but according to the school founders, worthwhile. P.E. Isaac Bonewits has chosen to take his degree, his lifetime of experience, and his driving energy to create an academy that is truly a benefit to its students and future alumni. This will be a life changing experience for everyone who gets involved.”

The new school has been built for Bonewits by Witch School, one of the oldest and largest (and some might say controversial) online schools aimed at teaching magic. Real Magic School isn’t the first online magic school to be built around a charismatic Pagan “headmaster”, Oberon Zell-Ravenheart’s Grey School of Wizardry comes immediately to mind, though it does seem to be aiming for a more academic feel while trying to avoid Harry Potter comparisons.

“While the Harry Potter Phenomenon swept the world and has offered a fictional view of a Magical Academy, Isaac is not Dumbledore and Real Magic School is not Hogwarts. Real Magic School is definitely real world and has a truly academic and educational philosophy unmatched in today’s world. Isaac Bonewits is a serious teacher, along with Phaedra, with lifelong experience, and is one of the most respected voices in the Pagan world today calling for academic truth and excellence in the study of magic and thaumaturgy, history, and Paganism.”

It should be interesting to see where this goes. Does an online school with only two teachers (so far) have a real shot at gaining academic accreditation? If they did gain some form of educational accreditation would any mainstream college or institution accept transfer credits from Real Magic School? Real Magic School’s web site doesn’t have any course information up yet, so we will just have to wait and see what sort of curriculum is planned.